GOP platform panel strikes references to TPP

CLEVELAND — A panel crafting the Republican Party’s platform on trade has removed all references to the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement, citing Donald Trump’s rejection of the deal and the difficult politics that Republican incumbents are navigating.

“I think we should take out TPP completely,” said Tracey Monroe-Winburn, an Ohio delegate. “We know that our presumptive nominee isn’t in favor of it, one … and we have some senators who are running across the country that were in support of it at one time.”

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The new language must still be vetted by the GOP’s full Platform Committee Monday afternoon.

Andy Puzder, one of the co-chairs of the GOP platform economic subcommittee, suggested that TPP has become too thorny of an issue to take a specific stand on. Trump has found flaws in the current version, he said. Rather than wade into the specific agreement, he suggested embracing a broad trade platform that discourages “massive trade deficits,” negotiating better trade deals and enforcing existing deals.

“Who can argue with we shouldn’t have such big deficits?” he wondered.

The language Puzder described would dovetail more completely with Trump’s language on trade.

The platform initially urged the Republican-led Congress to reject efforts to “rush” passage of the TPP, particularly during a lame-duck session of Congress, but now simply suggests that “significant” trade decisions shouldn’t be rushed. That was already a stark shift from the GOP’s platform adopted in 2012. That document encouraged a Republican president to “complete negotiations” for the TPP “to open rapidly developing Asian markets to U.S. products.”